advent_crash

Hey everyone I want to start a Giant Bomb Video Game Book Club. A book club just for video game based books. Video game novels are my guilty pleasure and I know I'm not alone in this. I'd like to get a group of people interested in this so if you are interested in joining this club just sound off below and we will get started. The first book will be Dead Island (since I have to read it for review anyway.) Below is a list if upcoming books. When we get a group going we will start and choose an order for the books.

-Deus Ex: Icarus Effect

-Bioshock: Rapture

-Crysis Legion

-Mass Effect Series

-Alan Wake

-Metal Gear Solid and MGS 2 Sons of Liberty

It seems we are at the point in the gaming industry where there are at least eight different first person shooters coming out every year. I don't know about anyone else but I'm getting sick of gunning down bad guys from a first person perspective. Not to say I don't enjoy those games from time to time but I'm just ready for something a little different. I don't think the first person genre should be left behind completely but there is plenty of room for advancement. While any game that has a first person perspective is more than likely going to involve a gun and the player shooting dudes but that doesn't mean there isn't room for other features.
 
In the last couple years we have seen an advancement in the genre with realistic animations (which may bother some but I really enjoy as it gives a sense of character) and varied game play features.  The first games that come to mind are The Darkness and The Chronicles of Riddick. These games introduced some interesting concepts such as experiencing every day things (watching a movie and kissing your girlfriend) and hand to hand fighting from a first person perspective. I found these games to be highly unique and a great fun experience when they came out and I am glad to see sequels to these games being released. Far Cry 2 and 3 seem to be good examples as to how you can take a standard first person shooter and make it a little more interesting with dynamic character animation. I feel like varied animation can give a lot to a first person character even if it is a silent protagonist you can still get a feel of how this person thinks or feels in the position that they are in. Some people find this distracting to game play and that it slows them down but I am more than welcome to embrace good character animation in my first person shooters just so I can have a little more variety. 
 
Prey 2 is on the horizon and this game is giving me a lot of hope for the future of first person shooters. While it has the makings of most standard shooters it is also far more in depth with the fact that there are choices to make in the game and traversal elements for making your way around the environment (something Brink tried to implement, but well . . . yeah.) The one thing about Prey 2 that is most interesting to me is living through the life of a bounty hunter in first person. This is something that I wouldn't mind seeing more of in future games. All of the different things you can do in Prey 2 make this game so fascinating to me (aside from the fact that this seems like an awesome sequel to a terrible game) such as the option to play through your missions differently and the world they have created for the game.
 
I can only hope to see more variety in first person games in the future. There have been plenty of attempts with games like The Darkness, Riddick, Prey 2 and even fatal frame with the camera mechanic. I would even be interested in a first person puzzle game with no weapons (a first person horror puzzle games could be pretty fun.) I'm not saying the average Call of Duty game should disappear but a break might keep the series from going stale.

I have been playing video games since I was a small child and I will probably play video games until I am an old man and my fingers won't hold a controller anymore. From the days of the NES to now I have played almost every system I can get my hands on and have more than likely pumped thousands of dollars into this industry over the span of my lifetime. I know I'm addicted to video games, that has never been a doubt in my mind. I know it's a problem because I spend way too much money on this hobby when I have other responsibilities that go neglected just so I can buy one more game. With games becoming more expensive and me becoming more of a collector my bank account has needlessly suffered so I could by one more games that I may not even like just because I heard something cool about it and want to try it for myself.
 
I will play a lot of games that aren't necessarily that good but just because they feature a character or an art style that I really like. But one thing I do demand of my games is a very in depth and well developed single player campaign. I love very story driven games such as Metal Gear Solid or Uncharted. I have played through the campaign of Metal Gear Solid 4 and Uncharted 2 countless times and It is still a great experience. I buy my games for a great single player experience but I do appreciate a good multiplayer experience. For my multiplayer gaming I tend to turn towards the classics like modern shooters such as Call of Duty, but I am loving the emerging and unique multiplayer experience provided by Assassins Creed Brotherhood and Uncharted 2. I think more multiplayer options need to be explored and can bring a lot to the market of video games and maybe draw in a larger online audience. Multiplayer is getting tacked on to a lot of games now days and most of them don't seem to be worth it, such as Dead Space 2, but are a welcome addition to the mutiplayer experience. I definitely  think that every game should have a gripping single player mode before they are finished and shipped but a tacked on multiplayer is not the worst thing in the world. I think if more games are getting a multiplayer function than we may see some more interesting and innovative multiplayer styles in the future and that is a great concept to me. Infamous 2 was a great addition to the multiplayer experience, as it doesn't have a traditional multiplayer, it does allow community creations that add a lot to the game play and keeps the game interesting for a lot longer and I hope to see more community style creation multiplayer experiences in future games.
 
I'm trying to restrain my video game buying to only games that will keep my busy for a long time, and going back to play older games that I can pick up for a lot cheaper and save some money. Multiplayer is a good way to stay invested in one game and with more games getting multiplayer, for an addict like me, it gives me the hope that I will be spending less money by buying fewer games because one game can keep me invested long enough that I wont get bored and want to buy more games. The ability for a game to last more than just a couple of days is one of the biggest factors in me buying it and a great innovative multiplayer and single player will probably be the biggest factors that will make me stick to a game for longer than a week and help me stave of my addiction.

Id really like to see this game work. It was a cool concept when I first heard of it.

This almost made me cry! Thank god its true!

I actually saw this already and the fight scenes were pretty solid and I enjoyed it. Its a god awful terrible movie but I could see a small light in a dark place.

I would buy Tron Evolution on Xbox just for you guys to play that game. That game is my guilty pleasure for some reason beyond me.

Sweet! Ima start getting my hopes up for a metal gear collection then.

It's still hard for me to get excited for the 3DS.  The NGP has me actually more excited. It's the same that could be said for any system. It will be great if it is done right.